


Remembering You

by Alice in Stonyland (Raine_Wynd)



Series: Alexa Quartet [3]
Category: Highlander: The Series
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 1998-12-29
Updated: 1998-12-29
Packaged: 2017-10-08 15:33:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,600
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/77115
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Raine_Wynd/pseuds/Alice%20in%20Stonyland
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sequel to The Journal.  Revised version of the one posted to HLFIC-L.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Remembering You

_if I could hold moments in time_   
_as I would grains of sand from an hourglass_   
_I'd want to hold the minutes I spent with you_   
_and every time I think of you_   
_it's like holding a beach full_   
_and the waves crashing against the beach_   
_are comprised of my tears_

_if I could wipe away the pain_   
_as I would erase a chalkboard in a classroom_   
_I'd rub out all the traces of your love_   
_and every time I think of you_   
_it's like writing the story all over again_   
_and the pages of the journal_   
_are odes to the love we shared_

* * *

He had not been here in a year. He had not been able to, not trusting himself to keep his emotions in check, wanting nothing more than to hide away from the world again, the world of which she had been a part. Standing at the foot of the grave marker, the dark haired, wiry, young-looking man pulled his black trench coat more tightly around himself, protecting himself against a chill that had nothing to do with the rising wind from the coming rainstorm.

"I'm sorry, Alexa," he told the grave quietly. "I tried."

If only he had been able to get the Methuselah Stone in time.but how much longer would she have loved him? How much longer before his past, his violent life had come rearing up to interfere, as it had countless times before? He would never know.

She was gone. He was not.

He would live forever, unless someone took his head. She had not been destined to live out a year when they first met.

The irony of their love had not escaped his notice. Yet he had still taken the chance to love her for the moment, for the now that had existed. He had taken her to anywhere she wanted to go.

Almost without conscious thought, he folded his long legs to sit on the ground. From an inside pocket of his coat, he pulled out a battered blue spiral-bound notebook and began to read the familiar, feminine script inked onto the pages.

_Yesterday was not a good day to play tourist. But Adam held me on the balcony of our hotel room and we watched the sunset over the city. It wasn't as pretty as watching it from the ruins, as he had planned. He told me a story of someone who watched the sun set when the ruins weren't ruins, but whole buildings. It sounded almost like he had been there himself, but I know that's just me being silly. That would make him centuries old, and I don't think he could look as good as he does if he was that old. Adam's such a good storyteller, and I know he was just trying to distract me from thinking about the pain._

_Today I'm feeling better, but he's insisting that since it's raining, we can just be together indoors. I almost said no. My time is running short, and there is so much I haven't seen yet._

_We both know I won't see Christmas this year. I'm already regretting that. I love Christmas, the whole crazy spirit of it all. He calls it a pagan ritual run amok, but I know he's only being cynical about it. I've learned how to tease him out of those moods; he's much too young to be so bitter. At least, he's not dying, like me._

_It still seems unbelievable that he loves me. Me, a not-so-great waitress from a little bar in a town without an impressive name or history. I'm a nobody._

_He loves me._

_I feel like shouting that statement from the rooftops like a little girl given her most-wished-for toy at Christmas. I have been given an incredible gift, and I want everyone to know it._

_He — _

Abruptly, the writing broke off and became one long streak of blue ink. He smiled as he remembered that day..

* * *

Alexa sat on the bed, propped up against the pillows, a blue notebook braced across her lap. She was writing, as she had taken to doing so in the past few weeks. Adam lay beside her, his hand resting lightly just below her knee, his focus on the TV as he waited for the weather news. It was currently raining, and he was hoping that a day of enforced rest would help ease Alexa's pain. He knew she had to be hurting, but she endured the pain far better than he could remember anyone doing.

Suddenly, she giggled, and he looked over to see what was so amusing.

"What's so funny?" he asked her in a mock growl, loving the sound of her laughter. He lived for her smile, and took pleasure in her happiness.

She giggled again, her eyes dancing. She shook her head. "I love you," she said with a smile.

"Oh, really?" he asked disbelievingly. "And that's funny to you?" He grabbed the notebook out of her lap and set it on the bedside table.

"Adam, look what you made me do!" she protested, laughing openly now.

He plucked the pen out of her right hand and tossed it on the bedside table. "I'll show you what's funny," he threatened. Rolling over on top of her to pin her down, he proceeded to tickle her.

"Adam, stop it!" she ordered between helpless giggles. "Enough!"

Not getting the response she wanted and instead getting tickled more, Alexa caught Adam's face in her hands and kissed him soundly.

That quelled his tickling.

Taking advantage of his cessation of motion, Alexa deepened the kiss. Her tongue touched his in an intimate duel Ad am knew would be echoed later, in a different way. He felt her hands grip his shoulders as she pressed her slender body against his, her soft curves molding to the contours of his lean body. He gave himself freely to the passion she offered, his desire rising with every kiss, every caress. His blood pounded in his brain, and his breathing was ragged when he finally broke the kiss to trace a path down her neck.

She was wearing a denim sundress that buttoned down the front, and he took advantage of the numerous buttons to place long, lingering kisses on every inch of flesh he exposed. She was not wearing a bra, and he tormented them both by ignoring her breasts on his first pass down her body.

She leaned forward, releasing her arms from the sleeves. "Adam, please," she begged breathlessly as he pushed the now-completely-unbuttoned dress aside. She reached for him, intending to slip off his sweater and to undo at his pants, but he beat her to it, undressing himself entirely. He wanted only to feel his flesh aga inst hers.

Gently, he pressed her back against the bed....

* * *

He blinked past the tears, feeling the pain of his grief and lost love slice through him. The memory of their lovemaking that day was an aching, bittersweet, and all-too-arousing image. He closed his eyes, whispering her name like a prayer.

Reading her writing, he felt guilty for forgetting the details her words evoked. He had promised to remember everything, but she had known he would forget. He thanked her foresight even as he cursed the insecurity that had prompted it.

He flipped the page to another entry.

_I can't believe this isn't some dream I'm having. I never want to wake up if that's the case. Is this what Cinderella felt when her fairy godmother bip-bip-boppity-booed her the things she needed for the ball? Adam treats me like I'm his princess, and never mind the fact that I've never had a fairy godmother._

He smiled a little at the image. She had deserved the royal treatment, and not just because she had terminal cancer. In a thousand lifetimes, he had never met anyone who had captured his heart as she had. He had tried to explain the depth of his feeling for her to Joe, but words had not been enough to express how he had felt.

How he still felt.

He did not have to turn the page to remember a passage he had read earlier when he had first discovered the journal, buried beneath a stack of half-forgotten books in his apartment.

_...I don't know what my death will do to him, and I worry about that sometimes. He has, as my grandmother would say, an old soul.but even old souls feel pain, and he loves me as completely as I do him. If it was me watching him die, bit by bit, I don't know how I could stand it, knowing that with every passing day, he'd grow a little bit weaker, a little bit less enthusiastic about ancient civilizations and monuments to empires long gone to dust._

"You were right, you know," he told the grave where his beloved lay buried. "I couldn't stand it. I never could. I just didn't want you to worry." He sighed deeply. "But I'd pay that price all over again just to be with you, my love."

His fingers reached over to caress the name on the gravestone. He would never forget her. He would continue to love her. And now, he had her journal as tangible proof that she had loved him. He sighed heavily, shut the notebook, and tucked it back underneath his coat.

With one last look at the marker, he walked away, vanishing amidst the rows of statuary and old headstones.

The marker he had touched was etched with the name of Alexa Bond Pierson.

_Finis_


End file.
